Earlier this month, the inaugural Gippsland International Film Festival was held over three days at three separate locations across West Gippsland, Victoria. Presenting a diverse selection of short films, this event was a passion project for local filmmakers, Alana Auden and Edward Yates. I was able to attend the fifth and final session inside the quaint Rokeby Hall, roughly 12 kilometres from Warragul.
It was a beautiful drive to a relatively secluded location, during which I passed many perfectly maintained ‘forever homes’ as I entered the country village. The venue does not sit a great deal, but it was a full house, so to speak.
With a theme of ‘Creativity and Connection’, the nine shorts featured covered a broad range, from industry chaos to generational nostalgia. Among the highlights was Beehives and Bottom Turns by Brad Coetzee (Australia), a portrait of a coastal beekeeper and keen surfer. I found it to be a soothing and educational piece about the natural world with an echo of Big Wednesday.
All the way from Italy came The Screenwriter by Mark Petrasso, which cleverly parodied the genre and characters trope of classic black and white film noir. Despite ironically being a little too short, it did win Best International Short Film.
Sails by Nathan Niguidula couples the anxiety of young adulthood with social media addiction and perception as two friends with a buddy romance struggle to cross paths despite a digital connection from their pockets. Well filmed and edited, the emotional stress of the Gen Z rom-com was palpable. Whereas Love Shack ’99 (winner of Best Documentary) by Abigail Hargrave was the Gen X answer to The Big Chill, as friends reunite to open a time capsule that was placed at their shabby shared getaway, they christened ‘The Love Shack’.
In a region that has a lot of cinematic potential, creative culture has little presence. However, the Gippsland International Film Festival was a welcome infusion, so fingers crossed it returns next year.
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